The Pakistani air force says it has acquired the first of four Awacs surveillance aircraft from Sweden to boost its air defences.

An air force statement said the Saab-2000 Awacs aircraft landed at one of the main operating bases on Tuesday.

The statement did not say anything about the cost of the deal and when the remaining three would be delivered.

The acquisition of the Awacs comes after arch-rival India bought its own Awacs systems from Israel in June.

The BBC's Syed Shoaib Hasan in Islamabad says the Saab-2000 aircraft will boost the Pakistani military's early warning capabilities in the event of hostilities with India.

The aircraft can be used to provide information on all three spheres of military conflict - aerial, naval and land based.

Our correspondent says the Awacs planes and advanced F-16 fighter-bombers soon to arrive from the US will provide a qualitative edge to the Pakistan air force against its numerically superior adversary.

Pakistani military officials say the planes also have a greater range than similar aircraft in the Indian military and can be used as airborne command centres in case of a possible nuclear conflict.

I am not surprised to know this. I knew already that Pakista will definitely try to acquire AWACS somehow. Pakistan always competes with India in acquistion of military toys. If any country refuses to give high tech military toys to pakistan, he seeks for another door which may open his path in acquisition of weapons India already has

This deal has been in the works for a long time, it will take time to build the infrastructure around it also there may be issues of linking the Chinese made planes to it. Indian govt needs to make the SWEDISH GRIPEN the first plane rejected in MRCA.

This deal has been in the works for a long time, it willl take time to build the infrastructure around it also there may be issues of linking the Chinese made planes to it. Indian govt needs to make the SWEDISH GRIPEN the first plane rejected in MRCA.

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My vote goes for Typhoon / Mig 35 for India's MRCA. Tyhphoon is expensive but it's good quality aircraft. A high quality product costs a lot but gives good benefits. MIG-35 has good radar and Russia is offering ToT which would be beneficial to us

The pakistan air force looks set to undergo a sea change in cpabilities with the induction of more AWACS(more erieyes and KJ2000) , F-16-52 & J-10 in the coming years, the AWACS shall provide a boost to BVR capabilities of the PAF as well. India needs to finalize the MMRCA winner soon(I'm voting for Rafale/ EF2000), while at the same time increasing the Phalcon fleet. the development of indigenous AWACS needs to be speeded up on a war footing as well.

The more I think of the MMRCA the more I think we should get none of these planes. I understand the political side of the equation but from a purely military standpoint India should have gone a different route. It would have been better for India to develop the MCA and get some help from Russia and make a plane that no other country could guage by how good or bad it was.

We will get the MMRCA in 2015 or something and we could've used the time to make our own plane that would be as good as any MMRCA plane, but cheaper and have more security because no one else would know what it's capabilities are. I think initially I liked how we might get planes like the Rafale and stuff but now I think we could have spent 10 billion + on our own industry and have a plane that we could be proud of like the LCA.

Sorry for going off topic but imagine if we knew more about Pakistan F-16 or China J-10 then they knew about our new MCA. I think that would be huge for Indian defence industry and maybe we could export our own fighter one day.

Looks like a small nation like sweden beat the superpower Chinese to getting the AWACS to Pakistan first, the Chinese had desperately tried to get their AWACS in first but it looks like a much smaller nation like sweden beat the highly industrialized superpower chinese to it, Chinese always playing the second fiddle in Pakistan, same with USA getting F-16's to Pakistan first.

Looks like a small nation like sweden beat the superpower Chinese to getting the AWACS to Pakistan first, the Chinese had desperately tried to get their AWACS in first but it looks like a much smaller nation like sweden beat the highly industrialized superpower chinese to it, Chinese always playing the second fiddle in Pakistan, same with USA getting F-16's to Pakistan first.

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lol, very funny.
anyway as long as China can produce those planes and get them sold, I will be happy. There were so many AWACS sold before, They all beat China, so what? No Chinese will feel like defeated. We are very satisfied by the progreass we made so far.
Maybe by your definition, that is called defeated, if that is the case, I think you guys must feel defeated or frustrated all the time.

you are second in your arms selling dreams just the facts , whether you can twist it into showing off your superpower status is upto you.

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Feel free to use your logic to deduce how Chinese feel if that makes you feel comfortable, it's totally upto you.

Chinese are proud of producing our own AWACS and selling it, and satisified with our progress, these are facts.

Apology, for off topic, this is the last one.

For PAF, I would say congrats, however, it will be a challenge for them to co-ordinate hardwares from different countries, they need to figure out how to share data between AWACS from Sweden and China.

this not a question of what Chinese are producing, I have not mentioned the history of the Chinese AWACS and the crash but the claims by Chinese members that China has reached the same point as other industrialized nations and they are on the same superpower level as USA, when in reality China as an arms exporter is so far a failure, failing to deliver the AWACS to Pakistan even before Sweden a small nation of 20 million,as many Chinese members here claimed they would. Arms exports are like a race and these are two examples of China losing the race in Pakistan.

Feel free to use your logic to deduce how Chinese feel if that makes you feel comfortable, it's totally upto you.

Chinese are proud of producing our own AWACS and selling it, and satisified with our progress, these are facts.

Apology, for off topic, this is the last one.

For PAF, I would say congrats, however, it will be a challenge for them to co-ordinate hardwares from different countries, they need to figure out how to share data between AWACS from Sweden and China.

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It is appreciable to see you government's attempts into getting indigenous as fast as possible. While we too technically are progressing at not-so-far distance, it is our lethargic bureaucracy that causes delays. I appreciate the Chinese government's dedication to their country; Something that our government is yet to learn.

The more I think of the MMRCA the more I think we should get none of these planes. I understand the political side of the equation but from a purely military standpoint India should have gone a different route. It would have been better for India to develop the MCA and get some help from Russia and make a plane that no other country could guage by how good or bad it was.

We will get the MMRCA in 2015 or something and we could've used the time to make our own plane that would be as good as any MMRCA plane, but cheaper and have more security because no one else would know what it's capabilities are. I think initially I liked how we might get planes like the Rafale and stuff but now I think we could have spent 10 billion + on our own industry and have a plane that we could be proud of like the LCA.

Sorry for going off topic but imagine if we knew more about Pakistan F-16 or China J-10 then they knew about our new MCA. I think that would be huge for Indian defence industry and maybe we could export our own fighter one day.

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MCA is already in development and believe me $10bn is not required for its development...

More over 126 MMRCA deal is to replace our Migs which was supposed to be done by LCA but.........

Moreover we are no more thinking of Pakistan. We have to look China as well. PLAAF is about 3 times of IAF...we need to have more planes in our force

Supply of newest awacs will certainly boost Pak's airspace survellience environment, but moot question is that, do they have some really capable fighter jets to really intercept incoming raiders from bombing important installations. As far as, Pak is concerned, they are very clear cut in their policy to use Nuke in case of Air attacks by India and hence I feel their awacs will certainly given secondary treatment.